Along Came a Husband (18 page)

She pictured Jonas leaving Mirabelle and her stomach flipped. When he first showed up she couldn’t wait for him to go, and now she found herself wishing he’d stay. Apparently Jonas was more unfinished than the rest of her business.

“What do you think he’ll do, Slim?” She nuzzled his neck. As if she’d gotten too close, too soon, Slim stood and stretched his way off her bed. “You, too, huh? Figures.”

Marin had always loved cats.

Missy’s thoughts returned to the short conversation she’d had with her sister the other day. Had she cooled down enough to call her back? Probably not. Had she talked to their father, told him about their conversation? What if her dad simply showed up one day on Mirabelle? She might be ready to face a lot of things. He wasn’t one of them.

Missy tossed aside her covers, showered and dressed, but instead of following her instincts and hightailing it out of her house before Jonas roused, she hung around putzing in the kitchen and making them both breakfast.

When he wandered down the stairs a short while later in only a pair of boxers, she immediately regretted her decision. She couldn’t force her gaze away from the dusting of dark hair covering his otherwise smooth, muscular chest.

He spotted her and stopped. “Morning.”

“Good morning.” Awkwardly, she looked away.

“Sorry.” He rubbed his pec muscles and yawned. “I’d have put some clothes on if I’d known you’d be here.”

“It’s okay.”

“I think I have some things in the dryer.” He wandered into the laundry room off the kitchen.

Missy found herself watching him, taking in his strong legs flexing as he bent, pulled a clean, white T-shirt out of the dryer and tugged it over his head. He came back into the kitchen, looking rumpled with his bedhead and wrinkled clothing, but incredibly sexy. “Hope you don’t mind I did a load of laundry yesterday.”

All the unnatural politeness oozing from him was going to drive her crazy. Then again, he was trying to meet her on her terms. How could she fault that? “No, that’s totally fine.” She pulled a plate out of the oven where she’d been keeping warm a breakfast burrito, filled with scrambled eggs, peppers and hash browns, and set it on the counter. “Here.”

“You made me breakfast?” He wouldn’t take his eyes off her face.

“It’s the least I could do after stiffing you with the dinner bill at Duffy’s the other night.”

He chuckled, sat at the counter and pulled the plate toward him. “This smells great.” He picked up his fork and paused. “Missy?”

She held her breath.

“I’m sorry you went through a miscarriage alone. I can’t even imagine how you must’ve felt.” He gave her a small, tentative smile. “For what it’s worth, a baby might’ve turned the tide for me.”

“Meaning you would’ve never taken that undercover assignment? You would’ve stayed?”

“Absolutely. I could’ve never walked away from that responsibility.”

A responsibility. That’s all a baby would’ve been to him. So what was she? “I gotta run. Have to do a few more things at my store before opening up.”

Jonas held her gaze. Clearly, there was more he wanted to say, but she couldn’t bear to be around him just now. “Have a good day,” he whispered.

Her hands shaking, she took off out the front door. The moment she reached the porch, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“Missy!” It was Ron calling from the sidewalk. “You coming, or what?”

“Yep. I’m coming.” Doing her best to put Jonas out of her mind, she caught up with Ron. They talked about Ron’s party for a few blocks. When they reached the back door of her gift shop, she invited Ron inside. “I have a surprise for you.” She unlocked the alley door and stepped back to let Ron inside.

“Well, I’ll be a son of a gun,” he said, looking around at all the free space and organized shelves. “Honestly, Missy, I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“I don’t.” She laughed. “Jonas did this. He helped me out front, too.” She followed him, waiting for his reaction.

“Mmm-mmm-mmm,” he said, shaking his head. “This looks great. It’s like a whole new store. How does it feel?”

“Good. Great.”

He winked at her and then said, teasingly, “Maybe you oughta think about keeping that man of yours around for a little while longer.”

“Yeah. Right.” Then her smile dimmed. “What is it with men and responsibility?”

He cocked his head at her.

“Jonas,” she explained. “All I am to him is an added responsibility.”

Ron chuckled. “Oh, I’m quite sure you’re more than that to him.”

“Nope.” She shook her head.

“Missy, honey, other than…” he said, pausing and fumbling a bit. “Other than, you know…sex, nothing says love better to a man than bringing home a paycheck, or fixing a leaky faucet.” He pointed at the shelving in her back room. “Or cleaning a storeroom.”

Missy glanced around as Ron slipped out the back door. Was it as simple as that? Jonas wanting to take care of her? As she was puzzling through Ron’s comments, her cell phone rang. On picking it up, she glanced at the display. Barbara. This was it. She could no longer avoid the inevitable. “Hi, Barbara.”

“So we haven’t chatted yet about Jessica’s surprise visit. I have to tell you, she was so pleased to meet you. Said she felt an instantaneous connection. I think this is going to work.”

“I’m not so sure.” Missy took a deep breath and accepted this wasn’t the first time Fate had been wrong about her life. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

For more times than she wanted to count, Missy explained about Jonas. Barbara never said a word, no questions, no comments, no guttural sounds of disbelief. By the time Missy got to the end of the story, her apprehension about the adoption had escalated to foreboding. Under no circumstances was she going to use her real family name and money to smooth over this situation. If she couldn’t adopt a child on her own, so be it.

“If I’d known you and Jessie were planning on coming to the island, I would’ve mentioned this sooner,” Missy finished. “Really, nothing’s changed. At least not—”

“I’m sorry, Missy,” Barbara interrupted. “I’m afraid everything has changed.”

Missy held her breath.

“Jessica has been adamant throughout this entire process that a divorce is an automatic disqualification. Her parents divorced when she was young and she doesn’t want that for her child.”

“What if Jonas and I don’t get divorced? What if we stay together?”

There was a long moment of silence. “I’m not sure I can, in good conscience, recommend you to Jessica. Under the circumstances.”

“I understand,” Missy whispered.

“Call me when the dust settles, dear, and we’ll start over again. Your match is out there somewhere.”

She turned to set her keys on the counter, and he would’ve sworn the sudden brightness in her eyes was the pooling of tears. There was only one other instance he remembered her being this sad. When she’d asked him for a divorce. The cat meowed at her and she picked him up, nuzzled his neck.

He wanted to kick himself, but the urge to go to her and put his arms around her in comfort overwhelmed him. While he wouldn’t allow that to happen, he didn’t need to be an unfeeling ass. “You used to hate cats,” he said softly, hoping he could gently urge her into talking about what was bothering her.

A lopsided smiled touched her mouth. “I did.”

“So how’d he come into your life?”

“Now there’s a story.” She came into the living room and dropped onto one of the chairs not far from him. “Only a few days after your funeral, I hit the road to no particular place. Stopped at motels whenever and wherever I felt like it. About a week into it, I stopped at this motel, got a room and then proceeded to clean the garbage out of my car. Went back to the Dumpster to throw everything away. Just before I closed the lid, I heard the tiniest of mews coming from under all the garbage.”

“Damn,” he muttered.

“I pulled stuff out left and right. Then I saw this plastic bag. Squirming. Barely. I found him inside. Sick. Malnourished. Eyes bulging out of his head. His four brothers and sisters inside the bag were already dead.” A tear dropped from her lash and immediately he regretted the topic of conversation. She looked at him and smiled. “Before that day, I’d never taken care of anything. I was having a hard enough time taking care of me.”

“But you did it.”

“He was so sickly for such a long time the vets didn’t think he was going to make it, but I made it my mission to nurse that tiny lump of matted fur back to health. Now look at him. You’d never know he was such a runt.”

He’d turned into such a beautiful, healthy cat it was hard to imagine anyone had once upon a time literally thrown him away. “You never have told me his name.”

“Slim.” She chuckled. “Slim chance of survival. That’s what the vet told me. He used to love cruising in the car with me. He’d wrap himself behind my neck all slim and sleek and look out the window. The breeze blowing in his face.”

Jonas could easily picture it. Missy and her cat against the world.

“I saved his life,” she whispered. “In return he saved my soul.” Another tear dribbled down her cheek.

“Whatever is bothering you, Miss, I’d like to help.”

She opened her mouth as if she might lean on him, and then quickly stood and shut him out. “Nothing important. Bad day at work. I’ll be fine.” Then she walked back into her bedroom, closing off the tentative connection between them as surely as if she’d slammed a door in his face.

Jonas wavered for a long moment. He had no right to interfere in her business, but had he become the kind of man who couldn’t give without taking? Not quite.

Walking down the hall, he knocked. “Missy?” He could hear her trying to stifle her tears.

She looked up when he opened the door and his heart nearly broke. She’d changed into a T-shirt and knit shorts. Sitting on the bed, she brushed away the tears trailing down her face, but there was no point. As soon as she swiped her cheeks dry, more tears replaced the others.

He sat on the edge of the bed and, setting aside his promise to keep his hands off her, pulled her into his arms. “This is about you wanting to adopt, isn’t it?”

Her body shook. “You know about that?”

“A little. Jamis told me at Ron’s party.”

Between broken sobs and ragged breaths, she explained all she’d gone through over the past several years in her quest for a family. It didn’t sound as much like a process as an ordeal.

“You want—ache—for a family. Maybe because you’ve turned your back on your own.”

She glanced at him, as if he’d hit a chord she didn’t know existed.

“I know you have your reasons, and they’re good ones,” he said. He’d always felt as if his presence had only widened the gap between Missy and her family. If he could help her repair the bonds, maybe then he could forgive at least a part of the damage he’d caused. “Maybe you should reconnect at least with your brothers and sisters.”

“I tried. I called Marin the other day.”

“And?”

“She hung up on me.”

Her tears gathered again in earnest.

“Give her some time. If she misses you as much as you miss her, I’ll bet she’ll be calling you back.” He paused and tightened his hold on her. “If she doesn’t, though, remember that you’re not alone, Miss. You’ve made a family here on Mirabelle. They all love you very much.”

“I know. It’s just that a child would complete things, I think.”

“Me reappearing threw a wringer in everything, didn’t it?”

She didn’t have to say anything for him to know he was right. If he’d known then what he knew now, he wouldn’t have come to Mirabelle.

“I’m sorry, Missy.” The apology didn’t begin to cut it, but it was all he had. There was no making this right. All he could do was lie back on the bed and hold her, help her feel better if only for a while.